Undaunted by the attacks directed towards him
concerning his policy of assisting young people (mostly, though not
exclusively, from County Louth and mainly girls), to emigrate to America and
Canada during the summer of 1856 (1), Vere Foster made it clear the following
year that he would be pleased to pay for the transatlantic passage of
suitable candidates, in order that they may escape from poverty and
unemployment in Ireland

In a letter dated 25 Mar 1857 to a local
newspaper (2), Foster appealed to anyone wishing to avail of such an offer, at
the expense of the Irish Pioneer Emigration Fund, to meet with him on
specified days over the coming two weeks in Dunleer, County Louth. Foster
and his brother Frederick were the principal contributors to the IPEF. Among
the other subscribers were the Prime Minister and Lady Palmerston, the Lord
Lieutenant of Ireland, the Rev. E. Dooley, J. Levins C.C., Chichester
Fortescue M.P., John Kieran of Rathbrist and many other farmers in the
neighbourhood. In his letter, Foster included a transcription of
correspondence he had from the Rev. Edmund O'Connor, formerly of Tulla,
County Clare, now parish priest based at St. Mary's Church, Canandaigua,
'the most beautiful village in the state of New York':

DEAR AND RESPECTED SIR – In reply to your favor
[sic] I have only to repeat what I have already stated to you, that I will
do all in my power to aid and assist any emigrants whom you may send here.
It is as good a section of country as I know for unmarried men and women of
good character. They will have a good opportunity of attending their
religious duties whether they are Catholics or Protestants. Do not send me
many at one time, you may send them often.

In consequence of this letter Foster proposed
directing about sixty girls, twenty at a time, to Canandaigua. He also
stated that he had received similar assurances from other religious, namely,
the bishop of Hamilton, the Rev. G. M'Nulty of Toronto, the Very Rev. Dean
Kirwan of Port Sarula, and other Catholic clergy of Canada West – also Rev.
James Hennessey of Detroit, the Very Rev. Dr. Dunn of St. Patrick's Church,
Chicago; the Rev. Mr. M'Faul of Janesville, Wisconsin, and others.

Foster said that it was his intention to send
about 140 girls and a few boys, his preference being for those who were in
farm service, those on the smallest wages, those with the best
recommendations, or those from the largest families, though only one out of
each family.

In an interesting aside, Foster stated that he
wished he could send a million emigrants as 'the ensuing scarcity of labor
[sic], and therefore increase in wages and comfort would produce America in
Ireland'. This statement places Foster very much in the mid-19th
century and as being familiar with the political and social philosophy of
Jeremy Bentham – utilitarianism (3) – a philosophy that was expanded only four
years later by John Stuart Mill (Utilitarianism, 1861) and already
ridiculed by Charles Dickens (Hard Times, 1854). In so far as Foster
was influenced by his own natural and generous sense of philanthropy, he
also calculated that the knock-on effect of removing young people from the
workforce in Ireland would have a more beneficial effect on the local
economy while, at the same time, adding to the much-needed work force in
America and Canada, all this despite the hardship which would be endured by
the young people – a basic tenet of utilitarianism.

In his letter Foster also made reference to his
liberal credentials, hoping that Tristram Kennedy [Independent Opposition]
and Chichester Fortescue [Liberal] would be returned as members of
parliament for County Louth. In fact, Fortescue [1823-98], on whom, it is
said, Anthony Trollope based his character Phineas Finn in the Palliser
Novels, was popular as MP and headed the poll that year (Kennedy came in
fourth (4)), and later was to champion the Irish Land Acts and the
Disestablishment of the Church of Ireland (5).

The 'City of Mobile' with its 120 'Foster'
passengers (not 140 as originally intended), sailed from Liverpool on 26 May
1857 and arrived in New York on 01 July. Foster travelled by steamer, a
journey of some two weeks (6). As was his want, he issued a circular on 04
August giving details of the voyage, for the benefit of friends and
relatives in Ireland. In it he stated that all his passengers had landed
safely in New York but forty-six [sic] of them, contrary to his advice,
had opted to stay in the city, instead of moving on to the destinations
originally intended. Foster then described the kindness with which the young
people were met at the various destinations outside New York. He also said
that they all had employment within a short time of arriving. Those who took
the 44-hour long trip to Janesville, Wisconsin were allowed, thanks to the
generosity of the railway companies, to travel first class, at emigration
rates. Foster also went on to provide mailing addresses for the young
people, as follows:

In care of the Rev. Edmund O'Connor,
Canandaigua, New York:

Casey

Margaret

Clinton
Mary

Clinton
Mary

Dullihan
Bridget

Hawkey
Alice

Keelan
Bessy

Lannon
Mary

Mathews
Margaret

Mathews
Thomas

M'Dermott
Margaret

Oaks
Ann

Oaks
Rose

Quigley
Rose

Rooney
Mary

Smith
Mary

Smith
Mary

Sweeney
Mary

Tierney
Bridget

In care of the
Rev. James Hennessey, P.P. Detroit, Michigan:

Bennett

Eleanor

Byrne
Catherine

Carroll
Alice

Conlan
Rose

Haitsin
Mary

Hanratty
Ann

Jordan
Ann

Keelan
Ann

Kiernan
Bridget

Quinn
Alice

Sheeran
Mary

Smith
Catharine

Woods
Mary (Feeragh)

In care of the
Very Rev. D. Dunne, P.P. St. Patrick's Church Chicago, Illinois:

Agnew

Bess

Begneil
Ann

Brennan
Mary

Caffry
Thomas

Cassidy
Bridget

Coleman
Bridget

Duffy
Rose

Ebbitt
Bess

Farquhar
Mary

Fay
Mary

Fitzpatrick
Ann

Flynn
Ann

Gaffney
Ellen

Henry
Alice

Kale
Catherine

Keane
Catherine

Kielan
Catherine

Matthews
Julia

Morris
Eliza

Porter
Eliza

Thompson
Margaret

Ward
Catherine

Woods
Ann

Woods
Mary (Greenmount)

In the care of
the Rev. Michael McFaul, Janesville, Wisconsin:

Boylan

Mary

Breen
Ann

Butler
Darkey

Carolan
Margaret

Carroll
Mary

Clarke
John

Cummerford
Eliz'h

Doyle
Thomas

Duff
Mary

Dunnigan
James

Durnin Bridget

Ginnity
Margaret

Grimes
Mary

Heeney
Michael

Hoey
Mary

Hoey
Rose

Kinahan
Lawrence

Leach
Ann

Leach
Ann

Loughran
Ellen

Lyons
Margaret

Magaulay
Bridget

Mallon
Bessy

McConnin
John

McCormack
Rose

McGeogh
John

McGeogh
Mary

McGuire
Ann

McKeown
Mary

McKeown
Mary

Mukettrick
Bridget

Murphy
John

Murphy
Margaret

Murphy
Sarah

Rodgers
Patrick

Rourke
Jane

Tallin
John

Ward
Patrick

White
Catherine

There were obviously some problems among his
passengers during the voyage as he finished his circular by saying (in
reference to his next planned trip):

Mr. Foster will endeavour to select a ship
manned by a more respectable crew than that of the 'City of Mobile', and in
which good discipline shall be preserved, and his passengers shall be
protected from intrusion and insult on the part of bad characters amongst
the sailors, who in well regulated ships are not allowed to enter that part
of the ship which is occupied by passengers.

He also stated that for the next voyage, on 01
September, when he would send one hundred more girls and a few boys, he
would require the highest recommendations. Whatever discretion Foster chose
to show concerning those who stayed behind in New York was to backfire on
him only a month later.

The damning and wildly inaccurate leading
article appeared in The Freeman's Journal on 05 September and was
copied by the Times of London a couple of days later. Whilst not
doubting Foster's integrity, the writer condemned the lack of supervision of
Foster's protégées, stating that some of the girls had been 'lead astray' by
the sailors on the ship, that some had been taken to brothels after the ship
docked at New York and that others were gaining employment as prostitutes on
the streets of New York. It also stated that 120 of the girls had stayed in
the city (in fact 26 had, and half of those had gone to relatives), contrary
to the original plan of placing them in gainful employment throughout the
United States and Canada. The point of the leading article centred on a
sworn deposition given by one of Foster's passengers, Susan Smith, who had
been found on Broadway in dire circumstances, beaten, bruised and near
starvation, forced into crime and prostitution. Her story is as follows:

'DEPOSITION OF SUSAN SMITH: City and County of New York: -
Susan Smith, late of county Meath, Ireland, being sworn, deposes and says
that she is 21 years of age, and came passenger to the port of New York in
the ship City of Mobile, Marshall, master, from Liverpool, and arrived on
the 29th of June last; that after the vessel had cast anchor off
Castle Garden, Margaret Floddy and four other passengers of the ship
were on the same night, at about eleven o'clock, taken off the vessel by two
of the sailors belonging to the ship, in one boat, and brought to the city;
that on the next morning, at about eight o'clock, the ship having meantime
been taken round to a pier, five passengers, names Mary Malone,
Mary Kelly, Ann Donnelly, Jane Crawley, and a girl names
Margaret, were taken off by the quartermaster named Bill Mooney, who
was always, so far as deponent knows, at the wheel during the voyage; that
at about twelve o'clock noon on the same day, Wednesday, deponent and a girl
names Ellen Neary, who was a passenger, were taken off the vessel by
two sailors, named James and Thomas, and brought to the house of Kit
Burns, No. 32, Water-street, where deponent has remained up to the
present time; says that the other passengers were taken off the vessel in a
steamboat on the day of arrival, at about six o'clock p.m., and brought to
Castle Garden, as deponent believes, and that meantime deponent and the
other females, as above stated, were concealed in the forecastle of the ship
by the sailors until brought ashore as above stated.

Susan (her X mark) Smith

Sworn to before me this 4th day of August,
1857

Bernard Casserly, Commissioner of Deeds.

The Commissioner, by the consent of Justice
Osborn, sent an officer to No. 32, Water-street, and arrested Ellen Neary,
and sent her to Ward's Island.'

The leading article stated that Foster should
have accompanied the girls as it was obvious the matron left in charge of
them could not carry out her duties, or did not understand them, 'at any
rate it was highly dangerous, as events proved, to commit such a number of
innocent girls to the temptation of a free intercourse with depraved men,
with no other restraint than the presence of a matron, who could exercise no
repressive authority in the face of such dangers'. It also pointed out that
patronising between the crew and the passengers should have been forbidden.

If the editor of The Freeman's Journal
had an agenda in criticising Foster it is likely that, as with the
Drogheda Argus the year before, (and even if the facts got in the way of
a salacious story), the problem was the mass emigration of people from
Ireland – 'Better let the whole sad history be known [that of the City of
Mobile emigrants]. It may produce ultimate good in wholly staying that
national madness for emigration of which we have well nigh seen the end'.

Vere Foster was in America when the story broke.
It was left to his brother Frederick, who was in London, to reply, something
he did on the same day as the story was printed in the London Times.
He wrote that contrary to what had been stated in the newspapers, twenty-six
girls had stayed in New York, of which 13 had been seduced by the sailors.
This, of course, he said, was too many, but was far from the 108 that the
paper claimed to be victims. He requested that the paper retract its
statement, in the interest of justice to his brother and for the information
of the public. In response to the letter, the editor simply replied, 'The
statement on which our observations were grounded were given in a sworn
deposition of some unfortunate girls, as well as the American and Liverpool
newspaper reports of the case', and made no attempt to correct the factual
errors in the original article or apologise for them.

Foster was not a man to be put off by the
vagaries of the press and he continued with his emigration policy and later
his great project of improving the national school system in Ireland. The
Home Rule politician A.M. Sullivan referred to Foster as 'one of the most
remarkable men in Ireland' (7). A Member of the Royal Irish Academy, John
Vinycomb, who knew Foster, in his article 'A reminiscence of Vere Foster'
described him as 'a man who could do such great things quietly and
unobtrusively to his life's end, was of real service to the community in
which he lived, and all this he did, not as a commercial speculation – for
he died poor – but as a thing born in the big heart of a philanthropist, and
carried out with the wisdom of a statesman (8)'.

The entry in the Calendar of
Wills and Administrations (9) for 1901 is as follows:

(3) The doctrine that an action is right in so
far as it promotes happiness, and that the greatest happiness of the greater
number should be the guiding principle of conduct. (The New Oxford
Dictionary of English, New York 1998)